


#SaveBucky

by nypinta



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), X-Men (Comicverse)
Genre: Bucky Barnes gets mentioned, Gen, Ha ha just realized I used "Revenge" as a tag & named the OC "Emily", Holy moly run on sentences!, I love Tony Stark but I find it funny when other people don't., I might rewrite this completely and go a bit for the funny, I really thought this was just going to be one chapter, Lauren Kinney - Freeform, Maria Hill says the thing no one else wants to, Oops, Revenge, clint barton - Freeform, natasha romanov - Freeform, x-23 - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-25
Updated: 2015-12-29
Packaged: 2018-05-09 03:24:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 11,435
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5523662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nypinta/pseuds/nypinta
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Laura Kinney, currently undercover as Emily Williams, had a plan. It had been simple. Once she had realized that Hydra was killing the offspring of James Buchanan Barnes, she meant to use herself as bait, let them "eliminate" her, follow them back to their base, & kill them all. (Hey, they started it.)</p><p>Nothing too complicated, right? </p><p>That was until Steve Rogers and the remains of SHIELD show up to "save" her.</p><p>PS This one kinda sucks and I plan on redoing it. Read at your own risk of taking a swig of milk when you think it's water. (That makes sense, right?)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Burning Down the House of Barnes

The remains of SHIELD involving themselves in her life was the very last thing Emily Williams ever expected. She had been staying in a local hotel, paid for by the Red Cross, trying to come to terms with the sudden gaping maw where her life had been and figure out where to even begin to rebuild it, so when she heard the no-nonsense knock on the door, she assumed it was another group of do-gooders or officials with more paperwork and was astonished to find instead Captain America standing next to Tony Stark and an unknown blonde woman. 

Emily stammered a few times, trying to remember English, before finally inviting them in. Steve Rogers, of course, was unfailingly polite about her astonishment where as Tony Stark seemed both accustomed and amused by it, which irked Emily instantly. The woman seemed apologetic at their intrusion but was following the lead of the Avengers she accompanied. 

Her guests settled around a table near the tiny kitchenette of her rented room, Emily listened with growing bewilderment and not a little bit of fear as the woman, (who introduced herself as Bobbi, but Tony insisted on pointing out she was indeed Dr. Morse with degrees in biology and forensics and Bobbi, Emily noted, seemed as irked by Tony as she was, making Emily like her instantly), explained that the gas leak was no accident. Her entire family was not killed in a freak occurrence, the result of incompetence or malfunction, but were in fact targeted by the very people Steve Rogers had exposed as having infiltrated the SHIELD agency a few months earlier, (and made a gigantic mess in Washington DC as a result.) 

Sitting across from “Captain America” (the quotes appeared around his name in Emily’s mind as soon as he began to speak, as suddenly he was a person to her, Steve Rogers, and not the persona she had read so much about since his miraculous discovery in the ice a year or so earlier), she realized at just how young he looked. Doing the math as he spoke, she realized he had been listed as deceased in the war when he was just 26. A kid from Brooklyn that had gone off to fight the Nazis as the epitome of American righteousness. Technically he was nearly 100 years old, but he’s only been awake for another two years since his fall. Although he must have lived through experiences she could only fathom, he was still, in many ways, no more worldly than she was. Both of them were basically, in terms of consciousness, the same age and she found herself wondering if the serum he had been treated with would have sustained his youthful vitality had he not fallen into the ice and in hibernation... and before she even realizes the question had been asked aloud, she sees him raise one golden eyebrow as he considers it. She gasps in horror that she spoke her thoughts out loud, her skin burning with a blush, but he only laughs lightly and says, “That is one question I don’t think I’ve ever been asked.” 

Emily notes Tony Stark rolling his eyes and he interjects bluntly, “Oh god, this isn’t going to become some Costner/Houston Bodyguard type situation, is it?” and although Emily recognizes the reference, she also notes how Tony’s eyes dart to Steve to relish that he does not. Deciding to be a jerk, Emily decides to use Tony’s actual age against him, “Who’s Costner?” she asks with a puzzled frown, “Is he someone famous from the 80s? I was only 4,” she pushes when she sees an annoyed brow furrow on Ironman’s face. But then the actual reference sinks in…

“Wait, bodyguard?” Emily looks from Tony to Steve, her mouth slightly agape at the idea. “For me?”

Bobbi decides to get them all back on track, “Yes, bodyguards. Steve will coordinate with personnel hired by Mr. Stark. But I’ll be team leader until we can ascertain who has ordered this attack on your family and why.”

The enormity of their words are slow to penetrate, except for the last, and Emily says with some trepidation, “I think I know why.”

All eyes turn to her in surprise and instead of answering the question, Emily gets up from the table and rummages through a box of the salvaged items from the fire. Although she is on task, it still sends her heart into her stomach at how little of her entire family she has left. Barely the size of a milk crate, the small box holds an aged tin of letters, a few pieces of jewelry, including her parents wedding rings, (both of which had been in a box on her mother’s dresser, placed there by her mother after her father passed several years earlier), a few photos with seared edges but could otherwise be restored, and her fireproof safe that contained the items she once deemed important, (such as insurance notes and birth certificates), but hated needing now. It was the slightly rusted tin that she needs and brings back to the table as the others wait in respectful silence. 

Emily opens the tin and inside is a packet of letters tied with a yellow ribbon. She carefully unties the bow, revealing the faded lettering and she hears Steve take a sharp breath. Emily looks towards him and says, “You recognize the handwriting?” even though she knows the answer. He had started to reach for them, as if by instinct, but her words halt his hand. 

“It’s Bucky’s,” he says, both with wonder and bafflement. 

Tony looks at Steve with a tense expression that he turns towards Emily, “James Barnes?” he asks sharply. 

Emily nods, but keeps her eyes on Steve as he stares at the words written on the yellowing envelopes. She can only imagine how many questions he has and realizes he’s trying to sort out the order to ask them in. 

So she supplies the most pressing answer first, “James Barnes was my great grandfather.” 

The trio sit mute for a moment until Steve asks, “How?”

Tony snorts and Bobbi shoots him a glare, daring him to make the joke she knows he wants too. He shrugs his shoulders, but Emily notes he keeps the crack to himself. 

“My great grandmother was Connie Williams,” Emily begins, looking to see if Steve recognizes the name but watches as he searches his memory instead. Noting sadly that he seems to be coming up blank, she carefully picks up the letters and shuffles through them, searching for a particular envelope, one that contains a series of small square photos of a smiling couple, taken in short order in a photo booth on Broadway. She slides the strip to Steve who picks it up as if he expected the images to turn to dust at any moment and stares at them in shock. 

“I knew her!” he says, then looks to Emily with the beginning of a smile that she watches fade with the weight of reality and for a moment Emily wants to cry for Steve Rogers and the life she knows he lost and has to rebuild, just as she does now. He looks back down at the images, studying them so hard Emily imagines he is attempting to memorize them, or will himself back to that time if he could only concentrate hard enough. The photos start innocently enough, the smiling couple both sitting, facing the camera with polite smiles plastered on their faces, but by the last, both are laughing and Sergeant James Barnes has his forehead pressed into Emily’s great grandmother’s cheek, both grinning like fools in love. Steve smiles wistfully, perhaps thinking of the life his best friend could have had if he had not gone to war, if he hadn't asked him to join him as part of the SSR…

He looks up at Emily, more questions brewing, questions she has already prepared for. "No, he never knew. She found out she was pregnant after he shipped off and she was going to tell him when he came back, but she got a letter..." Emily shuffles through the letters again, this time for a slightly larger envelope with a typed address on the outside, "that said he died in Azzano, Italy..." 

Steve takes the pages and recognizes the signature at the bottom, recalls the brief conversation with Colonel Phillips after Peggy told him about the 107th being captured. The letter he signed must have gone out before Steve had been able to find and rescue Bucky's unit from Hydra. "But he..." he begins.

Emily puts one hand on Steve's and he looks up at the girl he now knows is a direct descendant of his best friend and he marvels at the thought of Bucky as a dad. And that the chance to be one had been stolen from him all those years ago. His jaw clenches for a moment and Emily feels strange that her family history has more effect on a man she's only just met then it will ever mean to her directly. She decides to keep the rest to herself for now, that her great grandmother eventually discovered Bucky had survived Azzano but died a year later and that she had missed her opportunity to tell him about his son twice.

Emily hates to break his reverie but feels the trio before her should know that it might not be just her immediate family under threat. “Two of my cousins died this summer. Maggie in a car accident and her brother Michael died overseas, supposedly by an IED, and after what you have told me, I think my Uncle was murdered too.” She swallows, fighting back a sudden wave of emotion, “And I have second cousins... ” 

The news there might be other targets changes the posture of all three immediately, tension and the urgent need to take action making them all shift slightly towards Emily. Taking a breath to steady herself against the absurdity of the situation, she pulls out her phone, opens the contacts, and slides it to Bobbi. “Start with my Aunt Fran. She’s the matriarch of the McGraw branch of the family. Her mother was Rebecca Barnes." Steve blinks a few times, but Emily continues, "She’ll know where everyone is,” and before Emily has completed the sentence, Agent Morse is on her feet with the phone, rattling off instructions into a communication device Emily hadn’t noticed before. She leaves the room and Emily is surprised to see suited agents standing outside flanking both sides of her hotel room door. Tony and Steve are conferring but the sudden commotion coupled with her growing fear has her head spinning and Emily can’t focus on what they are saying. Suddenly, she is very very tired, her body protesting against wakefulness. 

A spike of fear jolts her back to lucidity for a moment and she says slightly louder than she intended, “Did someone do something to me?”

Steve looks at her in alarm, noting the droop to her eyelids. He turns back to Tony and sees similar effects on the Avenging billionaire. “Tony!” he says, shaking him. 

Tony’s eyes spring back open and he says with certainty, “Carbon monoxide…” and he turns, heading towards the window, but falters. 

Steve moves faster, rushing the window and shattering the glass with a single punch. The noise brings in the guards and he shouts commands, “Gas. Help me get them out!” 

Emily can’t keep her eyes open and feels herself falling to the side, but thankfully loses consciousness before she hits the ground.


	2. Agent Morse Has Some Doubts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bobbi has doubts about Emily.

"It's just a gut feeling, Steve," Bobbi says with exasperation. Her attempts to make him understand that something was off about Emily Williams falling on deaf ears. Their argument had led down the hall from the Avengers "situation room" and into the small kitchen where Bobbi tried to explain while Steve made himself some coffee, slamming things a touch harder then necessary in his annoyance.

"That she isn't who she says she is," he repeats with a huff. 

"No. Well, not really," Bobbi says again, "The DNA was conclusive, she's a direct descendant of Sargent Barnes and the family history checks out..." 

"Then what are you saying?"

"She accepts our security but it feels like she's testing their limits." 

Steve steps back and lean against the counter, the tension in his face going slack as he actually considers what she is saying. Bobbi lets out a breath, relieved she might finally getting through to him. 

"How do you mean?" he asks, with genuine interest. 

"Her restlessness is too synchronized, she insists on certain expeditions that thin her guard to the minimum, and on three occasions she's was able to completely separate herself from her detail and then seemed to wait for them to catch up to her as if she was timing how long it would take." Bobbi hands him a file with several reports and statements by the agents assigned to the girl as well as a few surveillance photos. 

Steve stands up straight in surprise, "She was able to shake SHIELD agents?" 

Bobbi shakes her head in the affirmative with a slightly angry twist to her lips and Steve knows instinctively that those agents were certainly put through their paces by the blonde woman after the fact and he did not envy a single one of them, sure that Bobbi had been ruthless in the face of their failure. 

"She feigns compliance, but she's testing us. I just can't fathom why."

Steve flips through the reports. He had spent quite a lot of time with Emily since discovering her connection with his best friend, and every day he noted something in the way she would hold her head as he spoke or the way she would smile with a sly twist of her lips that would remind Steve so much of Bucky, as if the part of him that might not live on in the asset Hydra made of him lived on in through her instead and Steve wonders now if his need for a connection with Bucky hadn't blinded him to some ulterior motive of Emily's. He didn't want to think she was playing him for the sake of man he had known since childhood. 

"Double the detail, but they're not to engage their subject," Steve decides.

"Don't tell her she has twice the security?" Bobbi asks, slightly shocked by his approach.

"She can't test what she doesn't know is there," he says as explanation, seeming more calm now that he's made his decision. But Bobbi notes he's still frowning at this latest development. Just as Steve didn't envy the agents Bobbi had to deal with after they lost track of Emily Williams, Bobbi did not envy Emily the confrontation she was sure to have with Captain America. 

"Consider it done," Bobbi says as she leaves Steve in the kitchenette, but she hears Steve's voice as she walks back down the hall as he says into his phone, "Hey Nat, I need you to meet someone..."


	3. A Difficult Conversation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve is a lousy liar.

Tony Stark had moved Emily to a safe house at Steve's request, but she was free to come and go as she pleased, shadowed of course by agents hired by the billionaire after they had been vetted by Steve and Bobbi. After recent events however there had been some turnover in personnel... so when Steve arrives at her doorstep, flanked again by security guards, Steve is starting to get nervous when she doesn't answer the door right away. 

He knocks again and the guard to his right shifts slightly, starting to also get uncomfortable. Whether it was concern for his charge inside or for himself if she had managed to slip out past him, Steve couldn't tell. Just as he was ready to break down the door, a slightly disheveled Emily answers, still in pajamas. It's Steve's turn to stammer for a few moments, not sure what to do seeing her in her sleepwear. 

She breaks the silence first, "Um, is something wrong?" 

Tired of deception, Steve squares his very broad shoulders and without asking, pushes his way inside the apartment, ignoring he slight huff of protest. He shuts the door, shutting out the guards, behind him. 

Steve guides her quickly to one of the couches in the living area and with a firm hand on her shoulder, pushes her to sit then takes a seat on the couch across from her. Feeling a twinge of guilt at his rudeness he finally looks her in the eye and expects to see shock or surprise, but is surprised himself when instead he sees her lips pressed in a thin line and her arms are crossed in annoyance. She raises one eyebrow at him with a tilt to her head that demands explanation in a way that makes his brain scream, "BUCKY" in large letters, the expression nearly identical to the one his Sarge would get when Steve was being particularly bone headed, or was about to do something that scared the hell out of Barnes, (because it was bone headed). Steve sighs and shoves the comparison aside. He needs to be in the here and now, not superimposing his lost friend on the woman in front of him. 

"Are you playing games with us?" Steve asks with more anger than he intended to show. 

She pales slightly, but with confusion, not guilt. "I..." she begins, "what do you mean?" 

"How did you lose your security detail?"

She stares at him for a moment, then says, "I did what?"

Steve's eyes narrow. "Three times."

Both of her eyebrows shoot up in completely shock. She repeats with more force, "I did what?"

A voice in his ear piece says quietly, "Damn." Steve clears his throat. A one word comment such as that offered him no help at all. Natasha understands and adds, "I can't tell, Rogers. She could be lying..." 

Steve tries to hide his surprise but must have failed as Emily reacts to the look of puzzlement on his face. "What's going on?" She asks, a slight tremble in her voice. 

Steve ignores either her reaction or her performance and pushes on, "We're trying to help you," he says, leaning forward slightly as if by sheer will alone he can make her understand, "But we can't if you're keeping something from us." 

She stares at him for a moment, studying his face, and thinks how amazing it is to find someone that has no deception in their arsenal. Everything about him is earnest and true and his only goal is to help others and he reminds her so strongly of an eager puppy, albeit a really rather large one. It isn't until a few seconds after she has the thought that she realizes she said it out loud as she watches the pink flush bloom on his cheeks. 

Natasha laughs in a quick snort in his ear, while in front of him Emily's eyes go wide as she covers her mouth with her hands and apologizes in a muffle through her fingers. 

"She's not wrong," Nat says, still amused, and Steve hates he can't respond at the moment, but she continues, "If she can't keep a thought like that behind her teeth, not sure she could keep anything of more substance to herself, Steve." 

He decides to stay his ground and rather than give in to her gaffe, he just narrows his eyes expectantly, "Out with it," he demands.

Emily tries to stare him down, but he crosses his arms, not to close himself off, but to denote his refusal to budge, and one brow raises just slightly. She begins to chew on her bottom lip, perhaps in a last ditch attempt to hold back her words, but she fails completely. 

"I'm furious," she says with a force he wasn't expecting. "I'm angry and confused and none of this makes any sense," she rails. "My family is gone and for what? Because we're related to someone that died nearly 70 years ago? Why?" She demands. "Why us? We were picked off one by one and it took three generations of my family dying in a fire to get anyone to notice!" 

She stands suddenly, her movement startling Steve in it's quickness, but he doesn't move. He allows her the space to move about the room in her anger. "I'm not... I don't always do things intentionally." She tries to explain. "Well, almost never. I just... " she searches for the words, can't, and finishes simply, "don't." She sighs, "I think maybe I was hoping whoever killed my family would come for me..." she finishes softly, then adds, "To do what, I have no idea. God, I'm so stupid." 

Steve starts to protest, but that seems to only bring back her anger, "Why would you even care anyhow?" Steve's brows shoot up at her question and she sits back down and amends, "I know he was your best friend. I've read the stories, just like everyone else, but... he," she sighs again, "he wasn't something our family was concerned about," she says with a shrug of her shoulders in apology. "My Nana Conn didn't talk about him. He wasn't a part of our lives. So, again, why us? Are they trying to make you angry? You didn't even know about us?"

She sinks back into the couch, her anger spent, and stares off at the wall behind Steve. She begins to chew on her lip again, but this time to keep her composure, refusing to cry in front of Captain America. Sure, she figured they had the place under surveillance and didn't doubt they had heard her cry herself to sleep several nights or wake up screaming, reliving the moment she came home to her house in ruins with emergency personnel pulling her away from the wreckage as she called out to her family in vain. But at those times she could pretend she was alone. But with him sitting in front of her, so large and present, she was adamant she would keep her composure. She shakes her head, denying the tears that want to spill and sits forward again. 

"Does Hydra hate you so much they would wipe out the family of your best friend out of spite?" She asks quietly, meeting Steve's gaze with intensity, as if this was the question she had been holding back and finally having decided to ask it, demands to be answered. 

Steve doesn't respond for a long time, but when he does he can hear Natasha hiss in his ear in disapproval, "I think Hydra is removing any possible sanctuary for Bucky," he begins and Emily gasps, possible guessing what his next words are going to be. "Like me, he didn't die during WWII..." 

She sits up straight in her shock, "Oh my god!" she says several times in a row until finally she manages to utter, "But how...?"

It took several hours to explain, but once he got started, Steve Rogers decided he had to tell her everything he knew. Unlike him, Bucky had family that he could return to, even if it was now just Emily, and Steve wanted her prepared because Steve still believed with everything he was that he would find Bucky and bring him home. 

"


	4. Hydra Makes Their Move

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve Rogers has been called away and Emily Williams is at the most vulnerable.

It's been a few weeks and since their confrontation and Emily has been better behaved with her security detail, being aware of her impulsiveness enough to not make sudden changes to her itinerary and make things more difficult for them. She even settled into a routine that did a lot to sort her thoughts as well. But she did complain often that she couldn't remain a ward of Tony Stark forever and would eventually have to sort out and live her own life again. 

Steve was sympathetic but steadfast in his desire to keep her protected. Emily considered it an impasse while Steve was satisfied in the arrangement. She was able to negotiate any and all cameras being removed from her quarters but agreed reluctantly with audio surveillance remaining, in all "public" rooms of the apartment. She was under the impression she had also negotiated down the number of security that tailed her, but Steve did keep the fact he had doubled the number before they had it out, so all she really negotiated was a zero sum reduction. 

It was a Tuesday, a rather uneventful day of the week. Emily normally stayed in and watched her favorite TV show and planned on searching apartment listings with the hope of actually being able to move into something of her own. Not that the apartment Tony was paying for wasn't nice, and by nice Emily meant "nothing I could ever hope to afford so I refuse to get used to it", but it wasn't hers. It was a constant reminder that her life is still not her own. 

She settled in the couch with the laptop propped up on her knees, her snacks in alphabetical order on the coffee table in front of her. Vaguely she wondered if whoever was listening to her apartment was sitting in an unmarked van on the street or another room in the building. Was it on this floor? Above her? She frowns, feeling a little boxed in rather than comforted. 

She sat up, frustrated, and tosses the laptop aside. Recognizing the restlessness in her gut that usually led her to doing something impulsive, something that would endanger her given current circumstances, Emily starts to pick up her phone to call Steve. But he's in DC this week. The committee hearings investigating SHIELD and Hydra's infiltration had finally managed to force him to make a statement, although lawyers had been able to keep his appearance before the committee a closed session, siting security concerns for the most currently visible Avenger, except for Tony Stark. 

'It'll be now or never', she surmised. Steve must have been concerned Hydra would use his absence as an opportunity as Emily noted the guards around her door had doubled again just before he left. She wanted to protest, but his shoulders were set in a way that she knew to argue would be useless. 

Her phone buzzes from it's place next to the potato chips, (to the left of course, "ph" coming before "po"), and she reaches for it absently. "Cameras went out in the hall. Get in the bathroom and wait for instructions." It was from Bobbi. She must be wherever the rest of her detail is. Outside she hears a light thump and the door bursts open. Her two guards, guns drawn, enter and look around. One moves directly to Emily, intent on ushering her into the bath as he says into his comm, "Target secure." Just as both Emily and her guard turn, he lurches forward with a spray of blood coating the couch, and Emily. He falls and she sees the second guard still pointing his gun at her. 

She tries to jump over the dead guard and into the bathroom, but the traitor guard is faster, slamming her hard into the door frame of the bathroom, knocking the wind from her instead. Rather than bringing the gun to finish out the remaining direct descendant of James Barnes, he pulls out a syringe. 

Emily reacts with a wide strike, hitting him in the throat, which turned out better than her intent of hitting him in the face. He staggers back, more out of surprise than in pain, and she makes a run for the doorway to the apartment instead. 

She makes it into the hall and halfway down before the Hydra agent is on her again. She tries to fight him off with a flurry of blows, but not knowing what she is doing most are ineffectual or do nothing but annoy the man as he pushes her back into the wall with a bone jarring shove. She is vaguely aware of muffled booming noises above her head and assumes that the rest of her detail is under fire. Reinforcements come out of the exit at the end of the hall, but Emily isn't sure if they are her guards or Hydra and so attempts again to run in the opposite direction, stopping to grab a fire extinguisher on the way. She immediately turns and swings the red container as hard as she can at the Hydra agent, managing to hit him in the chin. With him again momentarily stunned, she yanks the pin and starts spraying the white cloud of carbon dioxide in his direction, cutting off visibility before she drops the container to attempt her escape again. 

Whatever detectors the building has, they must have been triggered by the cloud of gas she released and the fire alarms blares above her head. She hears doors all down the hall start to open and a moment of panic fills her. She spots the Hydra agent again and is dismayed that he is only a few feet from her, and moving swiftly towards her. 

In the chaos, a couple opens the door nearest her to gape in panic at the cloud filled hall. Her pursuer lifts his gun and instead of pointing it at her, aims at the older man that has his wife close behind him, and shoots him in the thigh. Emily hears the man scream and watches in horror as the agent raises his gun again to shoot the wife and without thinking about what she is doing she places herself in between the couple and the Hydra agent. "Stop, stop, stop, I'll come with you!" she hollers in panic. 

He stops, everything stops. Emily can hear the man on the ground moan in pain as his kneels by his side. The gun is now pointed directly at Emily and she doesn't take her eyes from it as she calls down to the woman behind her and says, "Get back inside. Lock the door." The woman looks up in confusion, but seeing the man with the gun she moves immediately to drag her husband back into their apartment, while he helps by pushing himself with his one good leg. As soon as they are behind the door, the agent rushes forward, grabs Emily by her neck and slams her against the wall. He holsters his gun, and pulls out the syringe once again. 

Instinct kicks in and she begins her struggle again, but his grip this time is too strong and her weak attempts to block him from inserting the needle in her leg barely delay the action. She is vaguely aware of the commotion of more gunfire as she slumps forward into the arms of the people that slaughtered her family just a few weeks ago.


	5. Big Fish Eat Small Fish, Small Fish Eat Smaller Fish

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hydra's not so cunning plan.

Steve Rogers was made aware of the attack on Emily Williams while finishing his testimony before the committee that seemed more interested in scoring political points then ask actual questions. If the alert had come any sooner, Steve would not have hesitated to walk out without word to those assembled. However, his phone started buzzing as they were leaving the chamber where his testimony had been taped and the sprint to the waiting jet was a short one. 

On board he was met by former second-in-command to Nick Fury, Agent Maria Hill, now employee of Stark Enterprises, and Clint Barton, who still wasn't sure what his employee status was at the moment. Barton flew as Maria Hill briefed Steve on the situation. Hydra had one last agent in play in Tony's employ, a man that was able to pass inspection by taking the identity of an honorable SHIELD agent that had apparently died in DC but whose body hadn't been recovered. Steve berates himself and vaguely wonders if he shouldn't make Bobbi put him through his paces for not having seen that possibility. 

"We have video of the abduction, and I have to say I'm impressed she didn't make it easy for them," Maria says, as she keys up the flie to let Steve see it play out for himself. With no video in her apartment, all they have starts from the moment she burst out of the room into the hall, the Hydra agent on her heels. He watches as she fends him off the first time, then actually winces as she hits the man with the fire extinguisher, but he also smiles at the resulting head snap back. 

"We counted at least 20 agents that entered the two floors above and below where Miss Wilson was housed, in coordinated attacks to take out the support detail. It's unclear why they didn't take the target out, however," Maria says and Steve is struck by how calmly she questions why Emily isn't dead yet. But it is a valid question. 

"What is this, what is she doing here?" He asks as the video continues to her surrender. 

Maria doesn't bother to hide her surprise, "She gave herself up." 

Seeing the steadiness in her stance on the video as she puts herself in between the Hydra agent and an older couple reminds him again of Bucky and for a moment Steve thinks how proud his friend would be to know this is his legacy, an unselfish woman, willing to sacrifice herself for people she doesn't know. 

It made him furious as well. This was who Hydra was killing. These were the kind of people they targeted without out remorse. Good people. 

"How long till we're on the scene?" he asks, arms now crossed in anger. 

"20 minutes," Clint calls back from the cockpit. "Agent Morse is at the secondary safe house now, preparing to deploy once we get a location on Emily."

*****

Emily wakes up with a start in a concrete room. The floor is smooth but cold, the walls concrete blocks. There is no window, not even in the steal door that is painted the same color as the walls and floor. There is a bare bulb in the ceiling for light, but the switch must be on the outside. She notices a camera mounted in the corner, the small red blinking light giving away it's position in the shadows. 

She moves to the door that has no handle on the inside and begins to pound on it, begging to be let out. She isn't completely surprised that her cries are met with silence. Until the light goes out. 

The door opens with such force that she is pushed back and a cold blast of air hits her in the face and she realizes it's the expellant from a fire extinguisher. She coughs and falls back in an attempt to get as far from the gas as she can, but in the small room that's impossible. She is aware of the silhouette of one man wearing some sort of apparatus on his head in the light of the doorway before it closes again, shutting her in complete darkness. 

Shivering and coughing, Emily tries to hear where the agent is to keep herself as far as she can from him in the small room, but it isn't long before he has his hands on her, one tangling itself in her hair as the other lands a solid punch to her stomach. All the air in her lungs is forced out and she retches a few times. Her knees buckle and she wants to fall to the floor, but his hand in her hair prevents her from doing so. He yanks her back into standing position and releases his grip just so he can back hand her with his full strength. Her neck snaps to the side and pain explodes as blood fills her mouth and nose, making it nearly impossible to breath. This time she does fall to the ground, sobbing in pain and fear and the need for air. He lands a kick to her side that forces her onto her back. Then she feels a trail of fire run down her leg and she realizes it's the tip of a knife as it slices through her jeans. Another trail follows the first on her other leg and panic swells in her mind, 'no no no no NO NO NO', is all she can think and she swings weakly in his general direction, shaking her head in desperation. She can hear him chuckle and then feels another kick that makes her curl up into a small ball. The fire then runs down her back as she feels the knife dig into her flesh as he cuts away her shirt as well. She tries to crawl away from him but he is able to drag her back by her ankle, her bare skin skidding across the floor painfully. It's not as smooth as she had first thought and it leaves a burn on her skin from hip to shoulder blade. With another tug, the remains of her pants are taken from her and she tries again to curl into a ball. 

To her surprise he stands, the door opens again, and she is left in the darkness alone in just her underwear to shiver in pain and from the cold as her blood flows freely onto the floor. She coughs weakly and then just begins to sob uncontrollably. 

****

The agent steps out into the hall, removes the night vision goggles, drops the tattered remains of her clothing on the floor and barks out the order as he walks away, "Upload the video to that bitch." 

****

"What do we have?" Steve asks as he enters the secondary safe house. Bobbi is in her go gear as two other agents work various terminals. 

"The location beacon embedded in her clothing was lost 50 miles out from Chicago. We're cross referencing properties owned by known Hydra agencies or sympathizers that would fit the criteria for a mission of this kind. Based on her abduction, we believe she's being held as bait."

"For me?" Steve states more than asks. 

"Who else?" Bobbi asks. Steve and Maria exchange a glance that Bobbi recognizes as information above her level and she pushes her lips in a thin line. 

"Ma'am, we have an incoming video tagged for Captain America." 

"Load it up," Steve says before Bobbi can answer. 

"Can you trace it?" Bobbi demands of the tech and he turns back to the terminal to begin his work without bothering to waste time on an affirmative. The rest turn their attention to the video on the larger main screens. 

It starts at the moment Emily wakes up and starts to pound on the door. There is no sound, and that has an effect of making the scene as it plays out even more horrific. Especially after the lights go out and the agents watch as Emily tries in vain to fend off a Hydra trained assassin. 

Steve curses under his breath and Barton shifts for a moment from foot to foot, his only sign of agitation. 

"There's a live feed link," the first tech supplies, still working on the code from the video. The image switches, but not by much. Emily is still in the center of the room, but she has changed position slightly and they can see the blood on her face and the cuts on her skin have stopped flowing. She is barely moving except for a slight flex of her toes or her fingers opening and closing as she seems to make a fist in response to the pain of breathing. 

Bobbi gets an idea and asks of the other agents, "Can you get sound?"

Steve looks over at the agent, "You think we can communicate with her?"

Bobbi shrugs, "It's worth a try." 

Marie supplies without turning to either, "It's unlikely she'll be able to offer us any information on her whereabouts. She showed tenacity in the abduction, but she's not trained in any way." 

"Nat isn't so sure," Steve admits. 

"I can get sound," the second tech announces suddenly, and all the agents focus on the main screen with the live feed. After a few moments, there is an audible change in the speakers and eventually all of them are aware they can hear Emily's labored breathing. 

"Emily, can you hear me?" Steve says. 

She winches and her hands go up over her head. 

"Emily," he says again, as soothingly as possible while still getting across the urgency. "It's Steve."

She brings her hands down and struggles to life her head, turning it towards the blinking light of the camera. "They took my shoes," she says through her swollen lips. 

"I'll get you some new ones," Steve promises. 

She struggles to sit up, wincing in pain as she does so. "Don't come for me," she says quietly. 

"Of course I am," Steve replies, puzzled. 

"That's what they want." 

"Emily," Steve begins, but she interrupts. 

"James Barnes isn't coming for me. I don't matter to him." She shifts up and pushes herself against the wall, under the camera so she isn't visible anymore. She continues, "But you matter to him. I'm just the bait to snag more bait, Captain. Don't come for me." 

"That's not an option, Em," he says quietly. 

The door to her cell opens. Emily winces back from the light but she is ignored by the agent. He places himself in front of the video. "Chop, chop, Captain." He then shoots out the video.


	6. Emily Proves Bobbi Right

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Death doesn't ride a pale horse. Death walks on feet that lost their shoes. And Death is very very angry...

The unnamed agent drags Emily from the closed room. She isn't sure that's such a good thing and he leads her down the hall with one hand in he hair, the other on her arm. Any attempt to struggle is met with a painful twist to her arm which tears open the gashes in her back and causes her to gasp and sob. The agent ignores her pain and pulls her along with him to a larger room with high windows along the roof line. Like where she first woke up, this room is all concrete. But in this room is a wooden chair in front of a camera and behind the camera there are several terminals with at least half a dozen agents behind them, ignoring her presence completely. 

"It's time for your close up," the agent says as he forces her into the chair and roughly pushes the hair from her face. Plastic ties are tightened on her wrists and ankles and he walks away without a word, his job done. Emily is confused. They know Steve is already aware they have her, that he'll now spend his time searching for her. What else could they want from her? 

Another agent, one that is slightly older and probably keeps to the base while agents like nameless do the wet work. He begins attaching electrodes to her forehead and her chest, then clips something to her fingertip like they do in hospitals. Electrocution? Lie detector? Emily is baffled and scared and she isn't sure if she started crying or not but the older agent offers a sound that she thinks he means as comforting. 

"What do you want from me?" she asks in a whisper. 

The older agent looks at her, but his eyes are not kind. There is no kindness in him. He says, "Proof of life, for Captain America. And proof of death."

She stares at him. 

"We need him to know for certain that his attempt to save you was completely in vain, that you will be dead before he even steps foot on this base." 

She can barely breath but manages, "You're monsters."

"It is necessary. Steve Rogers reacts quite adversely to futility. Watching you die painfully, knowing that he failed to protect you, will be our starting point."

"Starting point? To what?" 

"Make him ours," the man says simply as if that actually answers anything for her. 

****

"We think we have three locations that are the most likely where they have taken Emily," Bobbi says. All of the agents assembled study the options, trying to narrow down the search to just one property, but nothing stands out to eliminate any of the three. Steve sighs in frustration. Divide and conquer seems their only option. 

"No luck with the trace?" he asks and Bobbi turns for confirmation from the tech on the task. He shakes his head, but turns back to keep working. 

"OK. I will take the plant outside Kenosha, Clint and Nat you're on the base at Crystal Lake, and Maria will take Bobbi to base under the rail yards near Woodstock. Recon and regroup. You find were Emily is, call us in."

"Sir, there's another live feed." 

Before the tech can bring it up, Steve decides time is too precious for Hydra games, "Go now. I'll handle this." The other agents head out without a glance back and Steve turns to the monitors alone.

The scene opens and Emily is sitting in a chair with her back to a blank wall. Her eyes are wide in fear but she is bound and her mouth gagged so she can't speak.g In the light of the day, Steve can see her injuries with greater clarity and his jaw clenches. An older man sits next to Emily calmly. 

"Ah, Captain. I would have thought you would have joined us already. We were just having a nice chat with our guest. She's quite charming." 

"What do you want?" Steve asks. 

"You, Captain." 

"Done."

"Well that was easy," the older man says with a false smile.

"Give me your location and we'll arrange a swap. Me for her."

"Sorry, Captain, but that won't do."

"That's the only deal."

"No, Captain. By the time you come to us, Emily Williams will already be dead. By the time this conversation is over, Emily Williams will be dead. You will watch or you will try to make it here before we can kill her. But you will be too late. And you will still come to us. You will make that choice."

Steve swallows hard, thinking as fast as he can. His only hope is to stall them and hope that Emily was being held at one of the two places he sent the others too. 

"Why would I do that?"

"You are an Avenger, Captain Rogers. If you can't save Emily Williams, you will want to avenge her. We have no use for her. It is simply the most efficient way." As if on cue, Emily tenses in pain and a muffled scream of protest rumbles deep on her throat, unable to get past the gag. 

Steve takes a step forward as if he could reach through the screen, "Stop!" he says, knowing it's futile. She continues to struggle against the bonds, pain twisting her face into a scowl as tears stream from her eyes. Eventually, she relaxes, breathing hard. 

"She's done nothing. Killing her does nothing!" Steve argues. 

"It upsets you. That is enough," the agent replies, then nods to someone off camera. The agent that beat her in the cell steps forward with a knife. Emily struggles and screams, but Steve notices her fingers moving in odd patterns on her right hand. She wore a ring, an ugly band that she said was a family heirloom. Apparently Hydra didn't feel it necessary to remove it from her, yet Steve realized now she was trying to work the ring off her finger. Not sure what she is trying but not wanting to draw attention to her attempts, Steve forces himself to focus on the knife in the Hydra agents hand as he presses it against her bare arm and draws several shallow cuts from her shoulder to her elbow, drawing blood and several screams of pain. Emily shakes her head from side to side, but he continues without pause on her other arm, taking his time with each cut. 

"The question now is what will she die from, Captain? Blood loss, internal bleeding from her beating, electrocution, or..." he leaves the options open and Steve doesn't want to even contemplate what else they might have in mind. His stomach lurches as he hears from behind the camera a distinct sound, of a lighter and the hiss of gas. Emily starts to sob. But Steve also sees she's worked the ring off her finger and has worked the circle into a straight bar, and shifts the small tool under her hand and the motion of her hand can only be her attempting to cut her restraint with the open ring. Steve wonders at that, but tears his eyes away as the younger agent comes back into view with a light blow torch. 

Emily's muffled screams become more frantic and the agent cuts off Steve's view of her, but he sees the man kneel before, cutting the bond off one foot to lift it forward, obviously intending to put the flames to the bottom of her feet. 

"Oh god," Steve says out load. The agents brings the torch forward, but stops and drops it onto the floor instead. The noise makes the older agent turn to the side and the smug expression on his face falls and he echos Steve's words, "Oh god!"

Not sure what he's seeing, Steve notices three points of metal sticking out of the younger agents back. He is pushed to the side and Emily slices at her remaining restraints with one well aimed swipe of the blades in her hands and on the upswing shoves them in the throat of the older man. Steve hears the sound of yelling from behind the camera and then Emily leaps forward. The sounds of death are all Steve Rogers can make out.


	7. X-23 Makes a Deal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Emily reveals herself.

Steve can only listen as whatever is happening on the other end of the video feed is out of the view of the camera. There are several screams of pain, a few attempts at issuing orders, and then all is cut off. 

"Emily!" He calls out, not for the first time. "Can you hear me?" 

Eventually she returns to the front of the camera, this time wearing the black cargo pants favored among Hydra and using a t-shirt to wipe the blood from her hands, arms, and face. Steve is stunned to see that her flesh is unmarred underneath despite having watched them slice her several times just moments ago. HIs mind reels at how that could be possible. She pulls a different shirt over her head and smooths it down. It's a few sizes too large. She sits in the chair and faces the camera and she pulls on a pair of boots, probably stolen from the feet of one of her now dead captors. 

"I found new shoes," she sinforms him casually, but without emotion. 

"I don't understand. Emily, what is..." he begins.

"That's not my name," she says finally looking straight into the camera. Her face is different. How she holds it is colder. She sits much straighter than he has seen before. But then she leans forward, "Emily Williams and her family are safe. I sent them to people I trust. A special school in upstate New York. I'll send the address along with everything I find here, except for the intel on the whereabouts of James Buchanan Barnes."

"But, why?"

"Because you'll kill yourself trying to find him." 

Steve's brows come down in confusion and a touch of anger. He's too close to finding Bucky to let her jeopardize his mission. 

"I will find him," he states. 

"Steve Rogers," she says as if it's truly the first time she's said his name, "You are a good man."

She says no more after that and he wonders if she expects him to acknowledge or deny such a statement. He tries to be. He wants to be. 

"I..." he starts, and she can feel a denial about to pass his lips. 

"You," she says with more force, "are a good man. You would die to save your friend, correct."

He nods. Of course he would. 

"You would also let him kill you if it meant his freedom," she says and Steve recalls their fight on the last Hellicarrier. He did almost just that. His lips press in a thin line, but he nods, needing her to understand how important it is to him to find Bucky. 

She leans even more forward and says, "I would spare him that." 

Steve blinks. Him? Spare him...? 

"Why are you doing this?" He finally asks. 

"James Barnes and I are the same." She stands up, looks around at the massacre. Moving behind the camera again she returns with one a lap top and begins typing in commands. 

"What does that mean?"

Without looking up she repeats, "We are the same. And I will bring him to you," she looks up then so he can see the promise of her words on her face. 

"You could get hurt," Steve says as she turns back to the lap top. 

"I don't matter," she says without hesitation and how true he can hear she believes those words shock him. 

"Of course you do," he says automatically and she looks at the camera in annoyance. 

She ignores his statement. "This base employs 47 agents and support staff. This was one of 7 safe houses that held James Barnes while he was their asset," she bites out the last word, "Once this target is removed, I'll return to this room and explain more. But you might as well call your team back. You know you chose the location most likely for Hydra to have Emily Williams for yourself. The others will find nothing of consequence. And I will be long done and gone before they can divert to this location." 

She starts to get up, then sits back down to add, "This won't take long" before standing back up and moving out of the view of the camera and out of the room. Steve can hear gunfire and a struggle but it quickly moves too far away for him to hear anything anymore.


	8. Hydra Gets What's Commin' To Them

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There are nine levels of Hell, but only seven layers to Hydra. Because they are underachievers and always will be.

Laura, formerly undercover as Emily Williams, suited up in whatever she could find from the dead in the "camera room", (as she dubbed it in her head), and armed with a map of the facility she had been able to draw up from the laptop of one of the many recently deceased techs, made her way to the "asset room" several levels below. 

Her original plan had been simple, once she had realized that Hydra was killing the offspring of James Buchanan Barnes. Seeing as she was also technically an offspring of the Sargent, she figured she was entitled to fight back on their behalf. She decided to use herself as bait, let Hydra "eliminate" her, follow them back to their base, & kill them all. (Hey, they started it.) 

Nothing too complicated, right? 

That was until Steve Rogers and the remains of SHIELD showed up to "save" her. So she was forced to adjust. And in fact she enjoyed the slight detour in her plan. Going undercover, and having to maintain the cover of someone good, someone decent, felt ... nice. Laura wasn't sure what to do with it now that the need to be Emily was over. She had a job to do, this mission of her own choosing to accomplish. 

The real Emily, and her entire family, was safely ensconced at Xavier's school. Laura had realized what Hydra was doing after the death of Maggie Collins in Oregon followed so quickly by the death of her brother who was stationed overseas. Laura had gotten to the family in time to fake the father's heart attack, move the rest of the West Coach branch into a safe house, and arrange for Hydra to think they had been successful in the gas explosion to eliminate several generations in one incident. Finding a relative of a similar age to Laura had been a bonus she took advantage of. The "sole survivor" angle was one she readily exploited, knowing eventually Hydra would circle back to finish the job. 

But with Steve Rogers as her bodyguard, she knew the chances that Hydra would use her as leverage in an attempt to draw him in was high and would make her job of infiltrating one of their bases so much easier. Her only problem was how to get Hydra to grab her with as little collateral damage as possible. Hydra, for their part, were crap at taking advantage of the opportunities she gave them before agent Morse noticed the pattern and had Steve intervene to keep Emily safe from her own tendencies to lose her security detail. 

It didn't occur to her that Hydra would chose an extraction option on purpose that caused as much damage as it did as a way of demoralizing the remains of SHIELD that was protecting her. In retrospect, it was obvious they would do it exactly as they had. Remind SHIELD how they had been able to infiltrate the organization, cause chaos and demonstrate their disregard for innocent lives, take Emily straight from their stronghold, (albeit this one simply being an apartment building safe house and not a secured SHIELD facility, as they didn't have any at the moment), and then leaving a trail for Captain America to follow blindly, walking himself into their grasp to offer himself for her. 

Luckily she was able to take advantage of their plan by using the carbonadium ring she wore to pass as a non super healing human. Pain was not her favorite thing, but something she knew she could handle easily enough. It was always temporary. The fact Hydra was under the impression she was a normal, pain fearing, human helped. A few punches and blood letting was bearable. She drew the line at a blow torch to the bottoms of her feet however. And maybe she did take some pleasure in ending that particular agent, thinking just a bit of how cold she had been in the cell after he doused her with the extinguisher... 

But she has a task to complete and not much time to complete it. This facility they brought her to was a recent construct, something with no paper or digital trail in the massive leak released by Black Widow, which meant it was not likely to be uncovered by the investigators pouring through all of that data, making it a way station for Hydra and their resources as they attempt to regroup. The intel on their current numbers and supporters would be a huge get, something she is sure that Steve Rogers and his assembled team would appreciate, which pleases her some, but her true focus is on their Winter Soldier project. To her surprise, very little of Dr. Zola's pet project was revealed in the massive info dump. Perhaps due to the fact the project's origins predated Hyrda's tendency to use computers to maintain records, or the fact Hydra effectively transferred ownership of their asset to the Russian's for most of his career. 

It was after the Cold War that the Winter Soldier was moved to American soil for... storage. She grimaces at the thought. Knowing the likely hood that each time he was thawed, the first thing done once he was again conscious was a mind wipe to ensure any memory gain while he slept was destroyed before they reasserted their dominance over the former Sargent Barnes to keep him their weapon. In effect, every time they woke him, they murdered him all over again. 

Laura was sure she was frowning. She shook her head to get it back in the game. Three floors to go and yet no one she has come across had managed to fend her off long enough to raise the alarm to the rest of the building. Only one even managed to utter a shout, but that was quickly cut off by her fist shoved in his open mouth before released her claws, severing his vocal chords. The rest died swift, silent deaths. Better than they deserved, she thought with a slight growl. 

Two floors later and her pulse quickened with the nearness of her goal. The "asset room", where she was sure several techs continued to work on the chair used to control the Winter Soldier as Hydra was sure they would be able to retrieve James Barnes and make him once again their tool. Laura required their research if there was any hope to reverse as much damage as possible done to Barnes. 

Several bloody deaths and one floor later she stood outside the door to the room that practically vibrated with the horrors it had inflicted, the bodies of the facilities inhabitants still warm but cooling quickly lay scattered behind her. She took a steadying breath before moving inside. 

The agents in this last room where not fighters. They were scientists and specialized technicians. They fell easily, although she did take her time with the lead scientist, the one that managed to escape D.C. to find sanctuary here, hoping to be useful to Hydra once again. It was necessary to keep him alive long enough for him to reveal the codes to his private files and to retrieve the key to unlock his handwritten files. Both now in hand, Laura stands in front of the chair itself. 

It was a monstrosity of a thing, hard and ugly. It's ascetic was fear inducing. Anyone being forced towards it would be scared out of their mind before it was even powered up, forcing electricity and toxins into someone's restrained body. Her breathing is short in reaction to the idea of what it would feel like to be that person while at the same time she realizes she does know what it's like, the only difference being the apparatus. Her growl on response to the thought it out loud. 

To her relief, according to the records kept by her most recent 'victim' (of justifiable homicide, she asserts to herself), this was the sole physical chair in existence. And the paper files contained the only schematic of how to build another. She of course would make sure before assuming this intel was correct, but in the meantime, she was going to make sure that no one, Hydra, the remains of SHIELD, the CIA, anyone, got their hands on this technology again and sets about destroying the thing completely. 

Dismantling it took longer than she liked, but she made sure to pull it apart as thoroughly as she could, then set about smashing each component into tiny pieces, so small that even the greatest engineer could not put them back together. Still not sure that was enough, Laura got to work removing all the bodies of the techs into a room on this floor farthest from where the chair had been, to ensure any cadaver dogs drew whatever agents she knew would come to investigate away from this area, and then planted as much explosives as she could, focusing on destroying that room completely, burying the remains of the chair in several floors of rubble, before feeling she had done all she could in the time she had in order to report back to Steve Rogers and keep him and his team from arriving before she could make her escape. 

To her surprise Steve was still in front of the camera, waiting for her return. With him was the rest of his team, and Laura was momentarily touched he did as she suggested and kept them from rushing off again to her location. 

"Targets eliminated, the structure is wired for destruction in 10 minutes," she reported. Steve takes a deep breath and for the first time she is unsure what he is thinking. Perhaps he isn't sure himself. 

"Are you alright?" he asks, possibly to stall her, or to stall to sort out his own reaction. 

Laura smiles in amusement at his concern and she recognizes the way he flinches oh so softly that it's one of her expressions that reminds him of his lost friend. She shrugs as if to say her condition is of no consequence. 

"James Barnes was held at this location for 6 years. It was the most recent before being relocated to D.C." she replies. She grabs the same laptop she had been using before and inserts a thumb drive with the chosen intel she had decided to share. "I am sending schematics for his cryo chamber, including the mixtures of medications and supplements he was supplied while in stasis. History of experiments, their results, and all techniques employed for full compliance..." She looks up to see the scowl on Steve's face, recognizing the anger she herself feels. "To help him, you need to understand what was done," she asserts and he nods, still scowling. 

"You said you were the same," he begins, "Were you also..." 

"We are the same," she says again and finds a particular file, one on herself. As much as she was willing to reveal, so that he would understand. She hits send. "But we are different." 

Behind him Bobbi gasps as she reads the file quickly. "Clone?" Steve's head whips around to the blonde agent in surprise, then back to Laura, his eyes once again assessing. Bobbi reads some more and then corrects herself, "No...technically not a true clone. You are biologically an offspring, but your DNA is more than half identical to James Barnes."

"Undesirable traits were replaced with DNA from a man with a particular gift..." is all Laura says. 

"Of healing," Steve finishes. Laura shrugs again. 

"Oh my god," Natasha mutters, looking over the files on another tablet. "Steve..." Laura knows which file the Black Widow was probably drawn too and steels herself for his reaction. But when he looks up the disappointment in his eyes was not something she expected. 

"Still think I matter?" she asks with a sad smirk, but then adds, "We are the same," she repeats, trying to make it clear the deaths she is credited with were not all her own choice. That like his friend, she was used as a tool and unlike anyone else, she understands the most what he might be experiencing now that he was secured his own freedom from his handlers. "And I am uniquely qualified to find him and bring him to you," she pauses, then promises, "Once I have him located, I will turn both him and myself to your custody."

"You're offering to come work with us?" Clint interjects and Natasha shoots him a knowing look, recognizing a moment from their own past. Laura simply looks baffled. 

"Work with...? No, I..." She it temporarily thrown by the idea. Steve would chuckle if it wasn't for the fact she had and already stated her intent to keep information he could use to find Bucky from him. 

"We can find him together," Steve tries. 

Laura's face snaps back into a frown. She moves towards the camera slightly, her angry face filling their displays. "You'll get yourself killed and he will never forgive himself!" 

"That's what happened to you, isn't it? Someone you loved died to free you," Clint realizes. Laura takes a deep breath but says nothing. She frowns at him as if to warn him to knock it off with his uncanny understanding of her. But Natasha recognizes the look on the man's face. Once he sets his site on a target, in this case someone he sees as a potential recruit, someone who's past actions he is able to look past, she knows he's nearly impossible to shake. She catches Steve's eye with a slight cock of her eyebrow and his raise in question, as if to say, 'Her? On the team?' Nat shrugs her shoulders. If Clint thinks it's a good idea, Nat thinks it's a good idea. 

Laura shakes her head, baffled by the people on the screen in front of her. They spent weeks protecting a woman they didn't know on the chance Hydra might bother coming back for her, and now that she has revealed herself and her past to them are still intent on protecting her, even suggesting she be a partner, not a prisoner despite that past. Despite her actions even on this day, the blood of the Hydra agents she slaughtered on her way to the lowest level still sticky on her boots, clothes, and even in her hair. 

Steve tries one last time, "He might kill you." 

She shrugs and says with a smirk, "I'll walk it off." She reaches forward and clicks off the camera.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, I totally wrote this wrong.

**Author's Note:**

> Slightly AU as on the show Agents of Shield it's never been mentioned that Bobbi Morse ever worked with the Avengers. But there really isn't any reason why she hadn't. 
> 
> Slightly AU version of X-23 that I've used before in Being Undone and Mirrors.
> 
> Let's be honest: doesn't everyone want to imagine tearing apart anyone & everyone that ever laid a finger on Bucky when he was in Hydra's clutches? Yeah, me too. So ta dah, X-23 to the rescue! But of *course* Steve Rogers would stick his nose in & Laura had to adjust her plan.
> 
> As I am heading into the last chapter I'm realzing I wrote this completely wrong.


End file.
